Wave of support overwhelms Hammonds Plains parents battling cancer

Jeff and Jill MacDonald of Hammonds Plains, who have three children, have both been diagnosed with cancer. (CONTRIBUTED)

At first, Jill MacDonald pulled away from the offers of help — the home-cooked dinners and the phone calls.

Several friends spread the word: no dropping by and no cards. Not just yet.

“We wanted to keep things normal,” Jill says.

She and her husband, both 41 and married for 15 years, had just found they each have cancer — Jill in her tibia, while doctors diagnosed Jeff with inoperable Stage 4 rectal cancer, which has spread to his liver and lymph nodes.

Jill had thought her nagging knee pain came from running; Jeff had been undergoing routine tests.

So the Hammonds Plains couple wanted to protect their children from the news until they knew more.

“Then, as we got closer to Jeff actually starting treatment, we sat them down and we explained that mommy and daddy both have cancer, and we told them what the treatment plan was going to look like, and that it was going to be a really rough year, but that we were going to get through it together.”

Jill speaks of her own diagnosis matter-of-factly, but her throat catches whenever she talks about Jeff or her children.

“(We told them) that sometimes mommy would be crying — and that if you see mommy crying, you know why and it’s OK. There’s going to be lots of people here and they’re going to be helping.

“They’re going to help us get through this.”

And now that’s exactly what is happening. Since the MacDonalds told Kate, Hannah and Ryan, the family has embraced the support that their loved ones wanted to provide.

That’s quickly snowballed into a network of messages and donations from across the country as word of the family has spread through friends and social media.

Tina Costain, Jill’s childhood friend, began a fundraising campaign online to help the family get support around the house, or help with child care, and with the unexpected change of having two parents go on long-term disability for when both begin treatment.

The campaign swelled to $88,000 in barely a week, with encouraging words and gifts flowing from all over Canada.

“The response has just been crazily overwhelming,” Jill said, her voice catching again. “To go on and read the comments that people are writing, it’s just really, really encouraging to Jeff and I — and to our family. It just makes us feel so good that there are so many loving, caring, people out there (and) we just want to make sure that all of these people know how grateful we are.”

Jeff has just begun what will be at least nine months of radiation and chemotherapy. Jill hopes to begin treatment next week.

Jill hadn’t wanted anyone to ask for help, but her family convinced her that people wanted to reach out and that she should let them. Now, she said she’s thankful for the messages and the donations from people she knows and those she has never met.

“We hope — I shouldn’t say, hope — I knowthat someday in the future I will be able to pay it forward,” she said.